koolherc

In NYC, I can definitely say it's cheaper. I'm near-vegan and my wife and I definitely spend less now than when we were buying cheese and meats. As long as you can find a real vegetable/produce store (not a supermarket), then you're fine. This is most likely the case in the outer boroughs rather than in Manhattan.

epistemology - study of knowledge, what it is, how we can have it, etc. epistemological skeptic = socrates "All I know is that I know nothing." long story short congrats on your 3 acceptances! is that 1 interview Duke Lit??

your whole post was excellent but this part was the kicker

A linguistics joke!: A panda walks into a bar. He takes a seat by the bartender and orders a burger and a beer. He receives his food & drink and makes quick work of them. Once he's done, he gets up, pulls out an uzi and kills everyone in the establishment except the bartender who manages to duck behind the bar. Eventually the Panda stops and starts heading for the exit. Before he makes it to the door, the bartender jumps out and shouts, "Why did you do that?!" The Panda sheepishly turns around and walks back to the bartender. He takes out a dictionary, flips to the P-section, and shows the bartender the page. It reads: pan-da. n. a mammal native to Asia; eats shoots and leaves

Probably not, to be honest. Not Hegel/Kant/etc, for sure. I probably shouldnt use that word among crit theory people because it gets people thinking certain things. Given my linguistic background, it would have a diff meaning, emphasizing the entities (or whatever) that we have in our consciousness and how language informs/constitutes them. How does the fact of the word "apple" make us imbue further thinghood onto certain world phenomena? And words like "blue" or "running" or "3" or "sadness," which do not seem to refer to concrete entities? At the same time, I am an epistemological skeptic, which would make most phenomenologists gasp in horror. But yeah, Douglas is way underappreciated. lol @ your "OMG" fanboy response.

lol @ this thread. I hope woolfie got in somewhere nice.

ask yourself this: if not you, then who better deserves to get into those programs? I think this question can apply to anyone, really.

To be honest, for you to say "Ah, I see" when you actually don't is really unwise. When you don't understand something, you need to ask about it. If he references some term you don't know, ask what it means. If nothing else, it'll show that you're actually engaged/listening and that you're insistent and determined. Alternately, you should try to come up with another phrase---perhaps something more conservative like, "Ah, I think I follow/understand/get what you mean, or "I think I'm following your gist" or something. Perhaps, best "I understand X but not Y." To answer your last Q, most reasonable professors don't mind that their students don't know jack---I mean, that's what a student is. What they do mind is pretention (hypocritical, perhaps, lol) and unwillingness to make the effort to fully understand a material.

I'm bent over laughing at some of these "insert info here" stories. great stuff ladies and gents

THIS is actually a real concern.

thumbs up for this line

i liked this response. balanced, tactful, and concise

ahhh... cool stuff. Have you studied Emory Douglas (the Black Panther Party graphic artist)? he had some great work. also, I grew up big on graffiti. are you into anything in that vein?

THANK YOU. It took me a while to get past this and convince myself that I had to ignore those people. Their motivations are different than mine. To them, not getting tenure would be failure. To them, teaching in community college would be a disgrace. Listening to them, I kept putting off applying to the kinds of programs I wanted to. The fact that I kept nonetheless thinking about it year after year made me realize that I HAD to pursue my academic interests. Ironic that being poor made me more able to say "I DON'T CARE" that getting a PhD in some interdisciplinary program might make me unlikely to get a good professorial position later. I'm doing it because I want to, not because it's convenient or easy. ---Just like the rest of what I've done. The way I see it, the less financially self-sustaining academia becomes, the more likely it'll start to weed out those people who are only in it for the status/money. The true thinkers and hardworkers would be left. Thanks to all who've posted in here for their motivating words and stories. Good luck to you all in all your endeavors.

hey guys. i applied to: berkeley rhetoric, stanford MTL, duke lit, USCS HistCon, Minn CSDS, OSU's cultural stud, and john hopkins' intellectual history. !!

hey! i also took a shot at HistCon, Minn's CSDS, but also some others. you hear from any yet?

I also applied to UC Berkeley. Not Davis, though. I haven't heard from Berkeley.

A different question, but I figured I'd post it in here: How strict are the two-page limits on the short essays? If I'm over by a line or two, are they gonna burn my app and throw the ashes into the sea? Thanks!

Anyone else applying to this program? Anyone been there or know anything besides what they say on their website? I noticed they don't have a placement webpage but their more researcher "Rhetoric" program does have one.

I'm also interested in this, but it seems like Political Philosophy departments don't exist. (! ? !) Can anyone offer some help on this?

Hello all. I've been lurking on the forums for a while trying to figure out, based on all the useful information I've seen, how my interests and I fit into this whole mushy humanities picture, but have yet to get a precise sense. my academic background: English BA from top 10 school (but I focused a lot on theory and philosophy courses) Linguistics MA from CUNY Graduate Center (finishing this right now; at least now I know Linguistics is a science and not in the humanities) I've also spent the last few years teaching remedial grammar and essay composition to highschoolers in a non-profit program, which I really enjoy. Teaching English 101 would be just fine with me. I'm not an avid lover of literature for its own sake, but I had a good time doing Theory+Literature in my English undergrad. That said, I am hungry to engage in philosophical/critical query at a high level, and write, and stuff. I'm interested in studying/arguing that 1) there is a degree to which, linguistically, we are unable to talk about ontological nihilism (nothing can be said to really exist) or monism (everything is one), as nouns and verbs reaffirm the existence of objects as distinct things; socially, we are encouraged not to do it; and politically, we are not allowed to do it 2) certain activities (organized and unorganized criminal activity, rioting, gang activity, non-medical approaches to depression, political apathy and non-voting) can be variously interpreted as political and, more specifically, as anarchistic. these activities and the people who do them are often non-historicized and are not incorporated into the narrative of what is considered positivist social discussion. that is, anarchism can be positivist, too, and we should be able to capture that. 3) the exploration of the philosophical connection between anarchism and non-positivist ontologies some texts/names I'm interested in are Hume, Taoism (studied 1.5 years of Chinese, but stopped recently), Baghavad Gita, Nietzsche, Husserl, Plato and the Pre-Socratics and skeptics, and Foucault. I also love Shakespeare---he's always big on giving voice to the non-historicized, but I'm not a buff. I'm considering the usual interdisciplinary suspects, maybe some Comp Lit, maybe some of the more flexible philosophy programs, and maybe some of the flexible English programs. What do you guys think? So...in summary: clearly, somewhat political but primarily theoretical, focusing through language. I don't wanna study history per se, but analyzing society is clearly an interest. I'm interested in language for its social, political, educational aspects. I also, though, have practical strengths in syntax/semantics and writing in general. (By the way, I know humanities PhDs stuff isn't a good way to make money, but I don't care. I realized that the last few years I've been thinking too much in terms of my career (as an academic or not) and not enough in terms of my interests as a thinking person. I had my most fun (and academic success), intellectually, at school, when I wasn't worrried about goal-oriented aspects of academia, but rather in interest-as-path. The thought that the field is getting more selective and less self-sustaining is empowering; it means that those who aren't really into it are dropping out and it makes me feel more confident about doing it!) Thanks a million for your feedback!!!